Anger

Got upset at something my mother did this evening and was shouting. My brother phoned me later and pointed out that I did not get nearly this angry when I was with my last therapist (who passed away mid 2016). My last therapist agreed with me that my mother was a narcissist but the aim was to be less reactive to her behavior. (He was CBT based). After his death my parents became quite ill and dependent on me for some time. While I was looking after them my mother was worse than usual ignoring everything I was doing and enthusing vocally about random favors from others; telling me she would be dead if she had to depend on me, etc. Im not sure if it was then, or prior to this exacerbation of the situation, that my therapist began to mention abuse... When I started reading up more about emotional abuse it felt like some things started falling into place. I managed to move in with my partner and in many ways my health has improved (for one thing I began to care about it.) However, I am very volatile around my parents and can become explosive My brother was asking whether I think this therapist is working out well for me.

Maybe the fact that you are expressing more anger is a sign that your mental health is improving with the new T. Certainly taking care of yourself is a good sign (i.e., moving in with your partner). Part of taking care of oneself includes expressing your feelings to others. Whether they react positively or negatively is on them, not you.

I am feeling more anger - especially at my mother and part of this has to do with the framing of the relationship. In my anger I was pointing out that half of the family is not properly provided for (some of us don't eat red meat and the amount of fish cooked is always scarce while the other side is plentiful). I asked straight out whether this was not meant to be a message and she said no. I then got all teary and apologized and she sort of laughed sarcastically and said 'you are forgiven'. Then she kept saying 'look at the meat, there is lots of meat. The other pescatarian pointed out 'yes, we don't eat meat'. (Neither of us have for about a decade).

Since moving out I have put on weight and look normal rather than underweight. I also started acting more healthy, doing exercise, eating vegetables rather than junk and taking care of neglected physical issues (turns out I have undiagnosed asthma).

Actually my brother's question was quite odd: 'do you think she is making you feel angry - and then you need to ask yourself whether you want to be so angry?' No one 'wants' to be angry but anger can be appropriate and feeling it may be necessary for ultimate wellbeing. So, I guess my question is whether it is 'necessary' to feel this angry and whether another type of therapy could maintain the move to health without exciting it?

My guess is that anger has been hidden in you for years or decades. It's very unlikely that the T made you angry to your mother (how can a T do that anyway?) but rather the T validated the anger the he/she saw in you and as a consequence you are starting to get to know it too.

I don't think there is any healthy way to move past feelings by avoiding them. Probably your mother has done many things to you for which anger would be a healthy response. So, why would you want to avoid anger when it tells you that you are abused? You don't.

But the "problem" might be that a large part of the anger you are starting to feel now is not coming from the present moment but rather is an "old" anger, accumulated over long time. But again, I don't see any way how you can avoid dealing with it if you want to learn to feel anger in a healthy way.

My personal experience is that after you first get in touch with your anger then there is an angry phase. I had a phase of few years where I accused my parents a lot for what they had done to me. I wanted to tell it to their face so that they would suffer. Few years fast forward and I don't have this desire anymore. I still have a lot of work to do with anger but I can do it now with my T in session and I don't feel I need to say angry things to my parents. Truth be told, I don't feel I need to talk to them at all and I've mostly cut them out. But, if I for some reason have to exchange few words with them then I don't have the urge to say something nasty and rather can say something decent and polite. But I don't let them close to me anymore, either.

The patient that is lead by the therapist to blame all their issues on their parents is a cliche that probably has SOME foundation. CBT would likely involve less of this as the focus is primarily on ones current situation and dealing with it in more functional ways. A therapist with a more psychodynamic background will dwell more on the roots of dysfunction. This focus would be much more likely to rouse anger. The theory is probably that this anger is necessary for change, and that, as you say, it has been longstanding in a suppressed form. Before I was more resigned and weary than angry, as such.

But then it depends on what you want. Do you want to focus on handling the current moment only or do you want to work through the older feelings. These are different tasks and require different methods. I just don't think you can do both simultaneously.

This dynamic and perplexity is familiar to me, and I think your confusion makes sense. Does your brother accidentally collude with your family system? There such a tension between being authentic to feelings and harsh experiences of the past and dealing with elderly frail parents. It is messy and hard. Really sorry.

I think this brother is quite good at colluding less than the rest. He might be concerned about me given my outburst. And you are exactly right about parents who are elderly and frail. Difficult and messy and confusing. Not least because they still need to provide some financial support.